Today's Family & Kids Activities in Rockland-Oct 8

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Whatever you're looking to do with your family and kids-libraries, festivals, museums, arts & crafts-you'll find it in today's list of fun and educational activities for families and kids in Rockland. Check out the NY Metro Parents' calendar for upcoming events!

Get into the Halloween spirit with live music, spooky story readings, pumpkin parades, and more. Come face-to-face with the largest bat in the world, the Gigantic Flying Fox of Malaysia, and more batty fun. Also enjoy samples provided by Whole Foods Market and daily performances of Little People Live!, including meet and greets with favorite characters.

Young artists are welcome to paint a piece of pottery for Halloween, Thanksgiving, or other upcoming holidays. Pick from pumpkin dishes, tree dishes, dreidel dishes, hand-print plates, menorahs, and more. Pieces can be painted and taken home that day or left for glazing. Fee includes instructions.

Spend a haunt-filled day at the homestead of Washington Irving, creator of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." There will be ghost stories, live musicians, magicians, puppeteers, a spooky mime scarecrow, old-fashioned games, tasty treats, hands-on activities like make-your-own scarecrow, and tours of the house where Irving lived until his death in 1859. Visitors are encouraged to come in costume.

Master storyteller Jonathan Kruk offers a dramatic reading of Washington Irving's classic tale, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." featuring the Headless Horseman, Ichabod Crane, Brom Bones, and Katrina Van Tassel. Flavored with live spooky organ music by Jim Keyes. Performances on the hour. Admission for this 45-minute performance are by timed ticket only, which must be purchased in advance at hudsonvalley.org or by calling 914-366-6900 (phone prices include $2/ticket surcharge).

The tri-state area's biggest Halloween event returns for 22 nights. Meander through an 18th-Century riverside landscape and discover a breathtaking display - more than 5,000 individually hand-carved, illuminated Jack O' Lanterns! Tens of thousands of visitors saw last year's sold out Blaze. The elaborate walk-through event features original, atmospheric music, sound effects, and synchronized lighting. Stroll through the Tunnel O' Pumpkin Love, and emerge to the incredible sight of a gourd-filled Jack-in-the-Box springing up and bouncing around. Flying pumpkin ghosts soar above the lantern-lit path. All admissions are by timed ticket only, which must be purchased in advance at hudsonvalley.org or by calling 914-366-6900 (phone prices include $2/ticket surcharge).

This stunning tribute to French Impressionist Claude Monet showcases a seasonally changing interpretation of the garden that inspired his art. In addition, two rarely seen paintings by the artist will be on view, and films, concerts, poetry readings, and hands-on art for kids will provide rich insight into the life and work of this renowned master. Through October 21.

Beginning Sept. 8, the orchards are open for picking each weekend through Oct. 21. Apple varieties include Cortland, McIntosh, Red Delicious, Empires, Golden Delicious, Winesap, Rome, Fuji, and Macouns. Call ahead to see which ones will be available each weekend.
The weekends of Oct. 13 and 20, kids can also pick their own pumpkins. Children's inflatables will be available each weekend from 12-5pm.

Mario Batali's Edible Garden returns to the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden, bringing plenty of fun for adults and kids alike, with cooking demonstrations in the Whole Foods Market Family Garden Kitchen, daily, family-friendly activities, and hands-on gardening. As a Garden friend and chef extraordinaire, Mario Batali has a featured role during The Edible Garden. Visit "Mario Batali's Kitchen Gardens," an interactive space filled with beds of vegetables and herbs where you can pick up recipes for his popular dishes, and learn how to create fresh, seasonal family meals. The fun culminates with a visit by Mario himself during the Festival Weekend in September. Through October 28.

This family-run farm, popular with local school groups, grows nearly 20 varieties of apples. Stop by on weekends for hay rides. And starting the third week of October, pick your own pumpkin. Call ahead to see what apple varieties are available on a particular weekend. Apple picking available daily through Halloween.

Experience the thrills and chills of the season with a garden full of intricately carved pumpkin sculptures, bugs, bats, parties, and parades. The haunted world of pumpkin sculptures offers plenty of hands-on fun each day - play inside the Pumpkin House, put on a scary show at the Pumpkin Puppet Theater, go on a parade, and have a 'hoot' learning about owls. On October 20-21, master carver Ray Villafane of Food Network fame transforms humongous pumpkins into zombies and other unearthly creatures.
There's plenty of hands-on fun each day--play inside the Pumpkin House, put on a scary show at the Pumpkin Puppet Theater, go on a parade, and have a 'hoot' learning about owls. Special events run throughout the month. Through Oct. 31 in the Everett Children's Adventure Garden.

Celebrate a New York Halloween tradition with safe, family-friendly activities including The Haunting at Habitat Mansion, Creepy Hollows Hayride, Hay Maze, Costume Parade, Carved Pumpkin Demonstrations and Display, musical performances, wildlife magic shows, craft workshops, and treat stations. Attractions and activities embrace the spirit of the season and highlight wildlife like bats, snakes, and nocturnal animals. Note: some activities require an additional fee. Children 12 and under wearing a Halloween costume will receive free admission.

Kykuit, the six-story stone house and rolling hilltop estate that served as home to four generations of Rockefellers, is open to visitors beginning Saturday, May 5, through Sunday, Nov. 4. Tours are available daily throughout the season except Tuesdays. Kykuit's modern and classical art collection, architecture, and expansive gardens are consistently rated the top attraction in the lower Hudson Valley, and draw tens of thousands of visitors annually. Kykuit, which means "lookout" in Dutch, includes a six-story stone house, multiple terraced gardens, art galleries, outdoor classical and modern sculpture, and commanding Hudson River views. Its hilltop location overlooking the Hudson River and the Palisades is 500 feet above sea level. Visitors to Kykuit learn the story of the Rockefellers, beginning with John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil, whose business acumen made him the richest man in America in his day. He later became the country's first great philanthropist. By his death in 1937, he had given away more than half his fortune through various philanthropic programs. Visitors can choose from four tours: Classic, Grand, Timesaver, and Selected Highlights. The Classic, ideal for first-time visitors, is a shorter experience than the comprehensive, three-hour Grand. Besides the mansion, both of these tours include time in Kykuit's art galleries, gardens, and Coach Barn, with its collection of horse-drawn carriages, vintage automobiles, and equestrian equipment. The 90-minute Timesaver is ideal for those on tighter schedules, while Selected Highlights maximizes time in the gardens. Visitors can buy tickets online in advance, choosing the exact tour, time, and date they want to visit. Tickets are on sale at hudsonvalley.org. Historic Hudson Valley recommends advanced ticket buying, particularly for weekend tours, which fill up quickly. Besides online, tickets may be purchased by calling 914-631-8200 (service charge additional) or at the Kykuit Visitor Center at Philipsburg Manor in Sleepy Hollow. All tours start at the Kykuit Visitor Center; doors open at 9am.

The Rockland County Department of Health encourages nursing mothers (and babies) and pregnant women to attend this free meeting to help them get started or continue breastfeeding successfully. The group meets the second Friday of each month and is led by Health Department Certified Lactation Counselors.For more information call the Breastfeeding Promotion and Support Program Monday-Friday, 9am-5 pm at 845-364-3865 or e-mail messingL@co.rockland.ny.us.

The Rockland County Department of Health encourages nursing mothers (and babies) and pregnant women to attend this free meeting to help them get started or continue breastfeeding successfully. The group meets the third Monday of each month and is led by Health Department Certified Lactation Counselors.For more information call the Breastfeeding Promotion and Support Program Monday-Friday, 9am-5 pm at 845-364-3865 or e-mail messingL@co.rockland.ny.us.

The Rockland County Department of Health encourages nursing mothers (and babies) and pregnant women to attend this free meeting to help them get started or continue breastfeeding successfully. The group meets the fourth Monday of each month and is led by Health Department Certified Lactation Counselors.For more information call the Breastfeeding Promotion and Support Program Monday-Friday, 9am-5 pm at 845-364-3865 or e-mail messingL@co.rockland.ny.us.

Young children are given the chance to develop basic competence in music by providing them with a rich musical experience in a relaxed and playful environment. Presented by Moon River Music Together with Catherine Rubin, the class teaches music through play. Meets the third Wednesday of each month.

Parents or grandparents with kids ages 2 through 6 can have fun in the Bounce! Jr. Zone, in the Bounce! castle, as well as on the main trampoline court. Head trainer Victor Byrne works with parents and children on a series of trampoline-based exercises and fun activities. Program meets every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon.

This lively exhibit features a colony of honeybees in a thriving observation hive and many interactive elements including hive cells for children to crawl through and large replicas of bees and their young. Visitors can learn about the fascinating life cycle of the honeybee, its colony structure, social hierarchy, and importance to our own lives.

Big Brothers Big Sisters of Rockland County is seeking mentors, especially men, to volunteer as role model friends for youth in our community. Applicants must be at least 18 years of age, have a valid driver's license and transportation, be covered under automobile insurance, and able to commit to volunteer for a minimum of four hours per month for one year. Call or go online for an application.

Nybelwyck Hall, a dollhouse representing Lilliputian life at its most luxurious, makes its appearance in Glenview, the Museum's 1897 river home. The 24-room, granite-and-mortar Glenview, and Nybelwyck, the 24-room dollhouse, share architectural features - a Great Hall and a double staircase that curves from the top floor down to the Hall. Nybelwyck's central facade is loosely based on the Hudson River estate, Staatsburg, the Ogden Mills House. The orange-and-green colors on its Victorian addition are reminiscent of Wilderstein, in Rhinebeck, the family home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's personal secretary. Dollhouse enthusiast Mark O'Banks created Nybelwyck Hall over the course of a decade and looked to the wisdom of a ouija board to name his creation. The house is furnished with found objects in its 24 rooms, as well as rugs O'Banks designed. Among its 900 objects are minute musical instruments that play, doors with intricate locks that work, and a tiny dollhouse within the dollhouse's nursery.

In 100 books, Jerry Pinkney has turned his artist's eye and hand to the story - a classic, a folktale, a fable - and readers all over the world saw something new, something they wanted to read and to remember. Pinkney is the master of the American picture book. More than 120 watercolor illustrations by the artist, who lives in Westchester, will be on view in the first major overview of his career as a designer and illustrator in "Witness: The Art of Jerry Pinkney." The exhibition follows his 2010 award of the Randolph Caldecott Medal for "The Lion and the Mouse." The Hudson River Museum is the only New York showing for this exhibition on national tour, organized by the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Pinkney has found it interesting to trace how the chapters of his life have knitted themselves into his art, touching on the cultural themes of the African-American experience. He uncovers, again and again, the energy in a small moment that surprisingly can change a life or turn an event in history. Most recently in his almost wordless adaptation of the Aesop fable, "The Lion and The Mouse," two creatures on a faraway African plain choose not the hard chase and bloody battle but, instead, exchange kindnesses. Fascinated with wildlife, Pinkney, in many books including "The Brer Rabbit" in "The Last Tales of Uncle Remus" shows us the human qualities of an animal as he shows us the animal in its natural setting. Pinkney, Philadelphia born and bred, and now a long-time New Yorker, has illustrated children's books since 1964, but it was not an easy path. Blacks were not expected to be able to forge careers in the art field. Trained as a commercial artist at a vocational school, he persisted and won a scholarship to the Philadelphia College of Art where his work took on the shading and detail for which he is now renowned, and he where he began to use color to convey mood and emotion. He has most often worked on children's books that celebrate multiculturalism and African-American heritage, as he took on the task of reshaping the perceptions of the stereotypes of blacks. He designed the first nine stamps of the US Postal Service's Black Heritage series. Art critics will look at the color of Pinkney's illustrations, the scarlet curve of Little Red Riding Hood's cloak, the golden blade of grass on the Serengeti plane. Sociologists will look at Pinkney the little boy, who without a visit to a museum or an art class, drew at home on the back of wallpaper samples. What the viewer will see though, in "The Art of Jerry Pinkney" is his wish: "It has always been my intent for my work to continue to breathe after publication. My hope is that (museum visitors) will believe that Jerry Pinkney cares deeply for people, making art, and visual storytelling." The exhibition includes a 96-page illustrated catalog that provides new scholarship into Pinkney's work in essays by the exhibition's co-curator Stephanie Haboush Plunkett, Dr. Gerald L. Early, and others. On view through January 13, 2013.

Home schooled children ages 5-12 will discover ecological and biological principles and gain an appreciation and understanding of the natural world at this monthly program, held the first Thursday of each month. Each two-hour program will consist of indoor and outdoor hands-on learning and close observations on a 380-acre living museum. Space is limited and pre-registration is required. Parents can sign up for the series or just a single session. Through June 6.

kids pre-school through second grade can sing Shabbat songs, talk about the Torah portion of the week, have a snack, then return to the main sanctuary to lead the congregation in Adon Olam. Saturdays through June 15.